What should have been
by gfaerie
Summary: Inspired by Steins Gate:0 this story explores the continuation of the "bad ending". In an alternative world gone wrong, where a grief-stricken Tomoya convinced himself that Nagisa was better off never knowing him, a single stubborn glimmer of hope seeks to force the hand of fate and put the world back as it should have been...
1. A world that has ended

It was past midnight when the shutter doors opened and a woman stepped out into the small garden at the back of the local bakery. In other circumstances she would have been considered very beautiful, blessed with long beautiful hair, a youthful appearance and buxom physique. But as the moon shone down upon her it highlighted her face, revealing deep lines of worry and purple dark circles under her eyes. In the pale light, she looked almost like a ghost.

She sank down on the bench just outside the door and in pure exhaustion put her head on the shoulder of the man who was already sitting there. He sat slouched on the bench, hands white with flour, a worn apron tied around his waist. Just like his wife, he was certainly very handsome, muscular with a strong jawline and a head full of wild hair. But if you looked closer, from the way his shoulders sagged to how he listlessly sucked on his cigarette, you would see that he too, was broken.

"Is she finally asleep?"

His wife nodded, eyes closed. The man took another deep drag from his cigarette, sending a cloud of smoke up towards the night sky.

"I don't know what to do anymore," the woman whispered. "Every day she slips a little further away from me."

"It's like she's given up on life. Even when she isn't sick all she wants to do is sit in her room, staring at the walls. She has no friends and doesn't want to go out unless we force her. Doesn't eat, doesn't laugh, doesn't...live." The woman swallowed hard.

"She'll turn 25 in a few short years, you know? Apart from the brief time when she tried to work she hasn't done anything since she graduated high school. She should be falling in love, travelling, studying, finding her place in the world. But instead, she just sits there, waiting for life to...end." The woman burst into tears. Her husband hugged her tightly, his face still hard, his hands clinging to his cigarette so hard he almost crushed the filter.

"I'm just so afraid that she is losing the will to live. That one day she will just decide not to wake up." The woman continued to cry for a short while, then dried her tears and composed herself again.

"To you know what she told me today?"

The man silently shook his head.

"She said there's something wrong with the world. That for her the world has already ended." The woman looked up at her husband's face, which was growing increasingly grey.

"What are we doing wrong?! She doesn't smile at our jokes anymore, doesn't smile at anything. And she is becoming so hard, like that sweet girl she used to be didn't exists in the first place. If I just knew what she needed. If I had just given her..." The woman's voice faded away, her face gazing into the night as if hoping to find her answers out there.

"It's not your fault. You're a wonderful mom, Sanae. Have always been."

The woman named Sanae gave a weak smile, still staring into the night.

"That psychiatrist says she's still depressed, it's like she mourning something. He wants to give her more pills. But I looked at the prescription, the price is-"

"It's fine," the man interrupted. "I'll go to the bank again tomorrow." He smiled down at his wife, stroking her hair.

"But we can only just barely afford her sessions as it is! And with the bakery just barely breaking even where will we find the money?"

"It'll work out, I promise you. We'll figure something out." Tenderly, he kissed her on top of the head before taking another drag from the cigarette. "We always do."

With gritted teeth the woman nodded, fighting to keep her panic under control. Gazing into her husband's eyes she kept nodding ever more vigorously as if trying to convince herself that what his words were true.

"First thing tomorrow I'll go around the schools. Perhaps I can get a second job as a teaching assistant in the evenings."

The man gravely agreed.

"I think I can find some more things to sell off. The baseball stuff for example."

"But, but-" His wife was looking aghast at the prospect.

"They're just things, Sanae. They can be replaced. I only have one daughter. You and she are the only two things in my life that I will never be able to replace." He put out the cigarette and rose, slapping his cheeks to try to wake up. "Time to go to work again, I need to prepare the dough for tomorrow. You should try to get some sleep."

Her heartbreak written clearly upon her beautiful face, his wife nodded and rose alongside him, opening the shutters back into their home. But before they had stepped over the threshold she spoke again.

"By the way, does the name Ushio mean anything to you?"

Her husband gave a slight jerk when he heard the name, looking profoundly confused for a moment as if trying to remember something he had long since forgotten. Sanae looked intently at him, her eyes showing that she knew exactly what he felt.

"Sounds awfully familiar, doesn't it?"

"Yes, but I can't quite place it. Where did you hear it?"

"When I came in tonight I found Nagisa in her bed, shaking, desperately clutching her stomach, whimpering that name over and over. Took me half an hour get a coherent sentence out of her."

Scratching his head the man shrugged his shoulders. "Could it have been...womanly troubles?"

Sanae gave her husband a sad smile. She loved the man to death, but in some areas, he was woefully ignorant.

"Nagisa hasn't had her period in over a year. I talked to the doctor about it. Apparently, it happens sometimes when the body is under great stress."

"An old classmate then perhaps?"

"Could have been," Sanae responded, clearly unconvinced. "I just don't remember anyone by that name."

"Perhaps when you go around the schools tomorrow, you can take Nagisa with you? Might do her some good to see the schools again. See some normal young people. Last time I saw her really happy must have been back when she was in high school."

Sanae hesitated. "She says she is too weak to go outside..."

"Then take the wheelchair. Surely anything is better than leaving her up in that room."

Sanae nodded, the couple kissed and went into the house, closing the doors behind them. The first red shimmers on the horizon were already heralding the sun's arrival. For a split second, the garden was silent. Then a faint pop split the silence and from within the shadows of the Sakura trees, a new fierce little voice spoke quietly into the night.

"Hang in there, grandparents of Fuko's best friend. Fuko swears by all that is star-shaped she will not let it end like this."


	2. Desert rain

Even under her large sunhat, the bright spring sunshine made Nagisa's eyes hurt. She was used to the dark and cool of her room and hated to go outside. The world was bright and loud and full of things that wanted to hurt her, only at home was she safe. Apart from that, she was ashamed, so ashamed of the looks she got whenever she ventured outside. That poor sickly girl, face gaunt like a corpse, thin as a stick, barely clinging to life.

At least the sun hat hid her hair, which in the last year had started to fall out. As if her life wasn't bad enough as it was, Nagisa was in her early twenties and she was going bald. The doctors told her it was because she wasn't eating enough but she had long since stopped taking their advice. After all these years they hadn't been able to find out a single thing about the vicious illness that had robbed her of her health and her youth. She was so sick of them poking and prodding her, telling her what to do, pumping her full of drugs that made her both dizzy and numb. Yet nothing they did kept the episodes away. Or the nightmares. What was the point of it all? A few more years and it would with all likelihood be over for her anyway. She was convinced that was for the best, at least then she wouldn't be such a burden for her poor parents.

Now she sat there, in her wheelchair, outside one of the popular high schools of central Hikarizaka City, wishing she could sink through the earth. Her mother had, overruling her objections, forced her to come along for today's errands. Which seemed to involve an everlasting series of tortures.

Everything that had been denied her was paraded in front of very eyes. Young pretty healthy girls in their spring dresses skipped in and out of the schools by the hundreds, laughing and talking with their friends, some even hand in hand with their boyfriends. Only a few glanced her way, some speaking in hushed voices before quickly hurrying past. Nagisa hadn't had a real friend in years, never mind a boyfriend. At first, it hadn't been so bad but over the years the sadness had turned to cynicism inside her heart, causing her to resent even the few that had made the effort to try to get close to her. Soon she would die alone, bitter, friendless and unloved. Meanwhile, everyone around her got to enjoy life.

After a while, she just looked down into the street. That way she didn't have to meet anyone's eyes, didn't have to witness all the things she was missing out on. After a while the noticed a pair of shoes standing still right before her, not moving. Finally, Nagisa felt forced to look up, straight into a pair of big golden eyes.

"Hmmm, Fuko isn't sure. Is it Nagisa or not?"

The girl standing in front of her was petite, with long wild brown and silvery hair tied up with a ribbon, dressed in what looked like a school uniform. She would surely become very beautiful when she grew up, Nagisa mused bitterly. The girl shook her head at Nagisa's expression.

"The other Nagisa never frowned. Fuko thinks it doesn't suit Nagisa. She should stop doing it." Before Nagisa could react the girl stepped in closer, placing her fingers on her cheeks and pulling the corners of Nagisa's mouth up until they formed a smile.

"Much better! Now Fuko recognizes Nagisa!" She exclaimed before Nagisa angrily slapped her hands away.

"So rude! Fuko only wants to help." The girl looked at Nagisa in shock, massaging her hands.

"How do you even know my name?" Nagisa demanded sourly.

"Fuko knows everything!"

"Why do you talk like that? Are you retarded or something?" Nagisa spat in an ugly voice. The words felt wrong as soon as they had left her, leaving an aftertaste like bile in her mouth. The little girl looked genuinely hurt, staring back at Nagisa in disbelief before muttering back in a quiet voice.

"Fuko definitely liked the other Nagisa better."

"Why don't you go to her then and leave me alone! " Nagisa shot back, folding her arms across her chest. For a moment the two girls locked eyes. The little girl had a steely glint in her gaze, refusing to back down. At last Nagisa averted her eyes.

"That Nagisa is gone, Fuko knows that. But even if this Nagisa is rude there is something Fuko wants her to see. Maybe then she will remember." Without further ceremony, the girl sprinted around Nagisa's wheelchair and started to wheel her off the main street.

"Where...where are you taking me?" In that instant, Nagisa was gripped by panic, her fear of the world and everything in it taking hold of her.

"Fuko has decided to forgive Nagisa for her rudeness. Fuko will help Nagisa. Fuko is like that, helpful and forgiving."

The girls had started to wheel Nagisa into one of the side alleys, next to the street. It was dank and dark, with various foul odours perfusing the air. Instinctively Nagisa tried to stop the wheelchair with her hands, but her strength proved no match to the little girl and the wheels just kept on turning. Years of doing little except lying in bed had made her so weak that she had trouble even pushing her wheelchair over long distances. Nagisa was yet again reminded why she hated her weak body, hated its frailty, the skeleton-like appearance, the pale and clammy skin.

"Stop! I want to go back!" She yelped as the wheels burned her palms. Panicking, she pinched her eyes shut and curled up in the wheelchair.

"Fuko thinks Nagisa is still a little crybaby. Fuko will take Nagisa back as soon as she does as Fuko says. Nagisa doesn't need to worry, doing what Fuko says is always the right thing to do. Fuko always knows what to do."

Slowly Nagisa opened her eyes again. The wheelchair stopped halfway down the alley. The girl with the golden eyes jumped back in front of Nagisa who again shrank back into the wheelchair.

"Why are we here? What is it you want with me?" Nagisa stammered.

"Fuko wants you to look around. Perhaps you will recognize something?" The girl said in a hopeful innocent voice while taking off her backpack.

Nagisa looked around. The alley was nothing special, a couple of dumpsters, a pile of broken tires in a corner, an oil drum, a few thoroughly rusted old fire escape ladders, an old shopping cart. She was just about to turn back to the girl when a slightly warm breeze passed over her right foot. Glancing down, she then immediately grabbed the wheels of her wheelchair and bolted backwards.

"There is a man lying here!"

"Fuko knows that," the girl responded coolly. "Don't you perhaps recognize him?"

"What? No! Why would I recognize some hobo?" Nagisa yelped. The girl looked thoroughly disappointed. Nagisa could see the man's chest rising and falling. Clearly, he was breathing, but apart from that, it looked like he was in really poor condition. She rolled the wheelchair another step backwards as the stench of urine and vomit washed over her. The little girl's shoulders fell as Nagisa pulled back, slowly shaking her head.

"Is he your friend or something?" Nagisa asked warily.

"Him?!" The little girl snorted and turned her head away from the man in a highly theatrical manner. "Hmphf! He's rude and ungrateful! Fuko hates him! He's Fuko's archenemy!" Yet despite her hard words, the little girl carefully reached into her backpack and placed a clean towel, a bar of soap, bread, some vegetables and bottled water next to the man. It was clear she had some kind of connection with the man. And despite pretending to the contrary, it broke the girl's heart to see him like this.

Having calmed down a bit Nagisa studied the man on the street more carefully. He had a shaggy black beard which made it hard to tell his age. His face was smeared with dirt, his mouth half-open and eyes closed. The rancid breath that reached all the way to her wheelchair and the various bottles of cheap liquor spread around the alley made it clear why he was lying sleeping in an alley in the middle of the day. Dressed in a rough overcoat and stained baseball cap he laid curled up directly on the street with only a few newspapers between him and the hard stone beneath.

Listening closely Nagisa could hear the man was quietly sobbing to himself, his hoarse voice humming some indistinguishable tune. Clutched tightly against his chest was a piece of soiled cloth. It somehow looked vaguely familiar but looking closer only revealed exactly how revolting the man really was. Deep down Nagisa knew she was supposed to feel some form of sympathy for the poor man. But it was like that part of her, the part that was supposed to be soft and loving, had somehow gone cold. So instead with a disgusted sigh, she averted her gaze away from the homeless man and turned it back towards the girl.

"Is this why you brought me here? My mom will be back any minute. If you don't take me back now I will scream." she demanded of the girl.

"Fuko wanted to show Nagisa that she isn't the only one hurting. And tell her that Fuko has not forgotten all that Nagisa did for Fuko. Fuko will never forget. Foku will never stop fighting to get back that which was stolen from her. To get Ushio back."

"Ushio?" The name struck Nagisa like a bolt of lightning. Dazed, something flashed before her eyes. The dark alley, previously washed out without colours, suddenly jumped to life. Inside her chest, her heart throbbed as if it had forgotten what it meant to pump life throughout her body and was now suddenly called upon to perform a duty it had all but forgotten.

For the briefest of moments, the image of a little girl dashing across a field of sunflowers in wild euphoria stood out clear as day in her mind. She could see herself in an airy dress, smiling and holding a parasol. But the Nagisa in the image was so unlike the worthless despicable face that she was forced to look upon in the mirror every morning that she was almost unrecognizable. This Nagisa stood tall, strong and proud, soft and loving, full of grace and beauty, unafraid of the world around her. And beside her...

But just as quickly the image faded again, leaving Nagisa feeling like she just woke up from a dream that was now slipping through her fingers.

"Nagisa was right. This world is wrong, it is not as it should be. Fuko does not know why or how it ended, there is so much Fuko has forgotten."

The little girl looked very sad for a moment but then gritted her teeth and raised her eyes again with fierce determination. "But! Fuko remembers Ushio, and so Fuko remembers Ushio's parents."

The girl glanced down at the homeless man again, then back at Nagisa with the same sad face.

"Even if they don't remember themselves anymore."

Nagisa squinted her eyes and looked at the girl again. Once again reality seemed to flicker before her eyes. Why did the sight of this girl fill Nagisa's head with the sensation of carving wood? Her fingertips traced the palms of her own hands, searching for calluses that weren't there but that she suddenly remembered so clearly. Had they been in an arts and crafts class together? But that can't have been, this girl must be ten years younger than her.

"Do I know you from somewhere? Have...have we met before?" Nagisa stuttered. The girl's face lit up like fireworks.

"Fuko knew it! Fuko knew there was still a little bit of the old Nagisa left! That means there must be a little bit of Ushio left as well! Somewhere in there!" The girl poked Nagisa in the stomach and then jumped high in a pirouette, punching her fist into the air. Afterwards, she started to pace back and forth in front of Nagisa, folding her brow in deep thought.

"Fuko just have to figure out a way to get her out!" The girl got on her knees, grabbed hold of Nagisa, lifted her shirt and put her mouth against the bare skin of Nagisa's belly. She normally loathed being touched some somehow this felt strangely pleasant. In another life, far away, she had been so proud of something there inside.

"Hold on Ushio! Fuko will get you out of there!"

"Nagisa!" came Sanae's cry from the street beyond. Looking over her shoulder she could see her mother desperately racing towards her. Immediately upon reaching Nagisa, her mother took her face in her slender hands, kissing it and then desperately looking it over for any trace of injury.

"Honey are you ok?" Sane looked around her, seeing the homeless man and immediately taking a step forward, placing herself between Nagisa and the man.

"Nagisa, did this man, did he do something to you?" She all but shrieked.

"Mom, no! I'm ok. This little girl needed my help so I followed her here." Nagisa pointed to the little girl with the unruly hair, who had retreated away from Nagisa when Sanae had stormed into the alley. With a guilty face, the girl now folded her hands behind her back and looked up at the sky, whistling off-key. Sanae stared at the point where Nagisa was pointing in confusion for a moment, seemingly looking past the girl at the alley wall behind her. Finally, with a guilt-ridden face, she placed her hand in front of her mouth and turned back to Nagisa.

"Oh, honey." Sanae carefully put her hand on her only daughter's forehead. "You must be having another episode. I should have listened to you and let you stay home." Nagisa opened her mouth to argue, but no words came out. Instead, she glanced over at the little girl again, standing there next to them clear as day.

"She can't see Fuko," shrugged the little girl, almost apologetically.

Am I going crazy? Nagisa thought to herself. Seeing people that no one else could see certainly wasn't a good sign. Still, the mischievous smile of the little girl as she waved goodbye somehow lifted her spirits. So despite it all, as carefully as she could she lifted her own hand and waved back while Sanae turned the wheelchair around and started to wheel her out. But when she looked back again the girl was gone, leaving behind only the homeless man in the alley. So it hadn't been real after all. Just another fever dream, just another cruel trick her mind had played upon her. Nagisa slumped in her wheelchair, the world turning grey and dull around her once more.

But just as Sanae hurried her out of the alley, one final flash of colour raced before Nagisa's eyes. Two friendly eyes from her childhood smiled up at her from the depths of her memory. Twisting her head over her shoulder, she caught one last glimpse of the ragged piece of cloth the bearded homeless alcoholic was hugging so tightly. For a fraction of a second, before the alley left her view, those same friendly eyes smiled right back at her.

As remembrance surged through her like wildfire Nagisa's trembling lips silently formed the lyrics of the song the man had been sobbing to himself. How could she not have recognized that song?

" _Dango, dango daikazoku..._ "

 _Authors note: This entire story is very much an experiment. As always I very much appreciate any feedback_ _ _you might have_ , positive or negative._


	3. Split in half

"Nagisa, please pay attention."

Sanae tenderly stroked her daughter across the chin. Nagisa looked up from the wheelchair, startled, eyes still distant. She was with her mother in the office of yet another in a long line of doctors. But this office looked more like the study of some old aristocrat, with expensive furniture and books lining the walls. A fat man with a fancy suit and smile that was too wide sat behind the desk opposite them. Numbly, Nagisa nodded as she knew was expected of her.

"Yes mom."

Satisfied, the man nodded back and spoke in a sugary voice.

"So, like I was saying, this experimental new hormonal treatment our company has developed has shown very promising results in...special cases such as yours."

Nagisa has heard it a thousand time before. It was fancy talk for that they didn't know what to try and this was yet another longshot. The man's smile was now so wide that it threatened to split his face in two.

"But for it to work you have to eat. Will you promise to be a good girl and do that?"

"Yes doctor."

"Good, good! Then that's sorted. And you have cleared everything with the finance department, Mrs Furukawa?"

"My husband is with them right now working out a payment plan" Sanae smiled an forced smile, glancing anxiously over at Nagisa. Like she didn't already know she was driving her parents to the brink of ruin.

"Excellent, I guess that is all there is to it then." The doctor raised an elaborate pen, signing a piece of paper before handing it over to Sanae who promptly bowed in response.

"I have to repeat: The medicine does come with a significant side effect," said the doctor hesitantly, his smile faltering slightly. He looked at Sanae uncomfortably and shifted slightly behind his desk, adjusting his glasses.

"As I said, in women, the medicine has a permanent effect on the ovaries. In nine out of ten cases it causes sterility. As a result, many patients experience a permanent loss of...hrm...sexual urges."

Sex drive? Children? Nagisa almost laughed out loud. Yet it wasn't funny at all. So instead, she just gave the doctor a flat stare. He squirmed uncomfortably.

"Do we have a choice?" Sanae was graceful as always. Only her daughter could sense the icy cold behind her carefully constructed exterior.

"No, no I guess you don't. Given the last episode...in any case, in Ms Nagisa's case perhaps it is for the best. The stress of a pregnancy on such a fragile physique..."

Nagisa closed her eyes for a moment in an effort to keep her composure. Just stop. Please just stop.

"Still, I have to ask for the record. Are you sexually active Ms Nagisa?"

It wasn't working. Tears started to well up in Nagisa's eyes. Quickly she looked down to hide her embarrassment. Couldn't he see that no one would ever want to touch her in that way? Sanae once again gently gripped Nagisa's hand and stroked it with her fingers.

"No doctor, my daughter is not active in that way," she said in a tightly controlled voice, folding up the paper and putting it in her purse. "If that is all may we please go now?"

"Of course, of course! I just need your signature on this waiver." Sanae signed so quickly that the doctor almost looked startled.

"And we are done! No need to look so sad miss. You can't miss what you never had, right?" he chuckled awkwardly. Sanae didn't smile back at the doctor. Instead, she had a sudden urge to call for her husband and his trusty baseball bat. Barely constraining herself she rolled Nagisa out of the room, burdened by the knowledge that yet another one of life's pleasures had now been denied her only daughter.

* * *

That night Nagisa sat out in the open air, looking up at the evening sky. Her parents were both out for the evening, no doubt on some errand to raise more money for her treatments. Nagisa knew she was supposed to stay at home but had found the air in her room suffocating, like she couldn't breathe there. So instead she had wheeled her chair out into the small square in front of the Furukawa bakery.

Next to her was the swingset she had used to play with when she was little child. With sad eyes, she viewed it up and down. When did her life get to this point where she couldn't even ride a swing? From her pocket, she produced the medicine bottle she had gotten from the doctor this morning. A white plastic bottle that when opened was full of tiny white pills. Nagisa picked one up and studied it between her fingertips. Such as small thing, yet one way or the other it would change her life forever.

Since she was little Nagisa had always known she wanted to have a baby. Someone small and soft that she could cradle, someone to shower with kisses and love. Someone to live for. The thought of another human being so utterly dependant on her was terrifying yet so true.

Nagisa found it hard to pin words to the feeling. It was something very primal, something that transcended definitions and rational thought. Something she just knew, something that lived and breathed deep in her very bones. Something she would carry with her until the day she died.

After looking around and making sure no one was watching Nagisa put the pill back in the bottle and screwed the top back on. Then she gently folded her arms over her stomach and cradled her imaginary child in her arms, softly rocking it back and forth. Last week's hallucination crept back into her mind. The doctors had told her she shouldn't dwell upon it, that it had just been a fever dream. Stray memory fragments that had been woven together by her untrustworthy brain. Yet try as she might she just couldn't get the vision out of her mind. This was perhaps her last chance to dream that dream before she had to kill it. That little girl, racing across a field of sunflowers. Someone that looked so much like her yet wasn't her. Nagisa's hands wandered to her stomach.

Something she could remember yet wasn't a memory flooded through her mind. The feeling of something there inside kicking. She blinked, the deep green of the trees around her seemingly leaping out at her, filling the grey dusk with colours. In her mind, the world turned and twisted, engulfing her in a vortex made up all the things that should have been.

The feeling of small lips closing around her breast, suckling eagerly. Long sleepless nights, spent wandering with something warm and soft on her shoulder. And finally falling asleep with a smile on her face, watching a small chest rise and fall, a small hand gripping her own. Nagisa raised her hand in front of her eyes, squinting even if the night was almost upon her. The light from the streetlights was suddenly almost blinding. No matter how she tried to shield her eyes, it seemed to slip right past, seemingly penetrating both flesh and bone.

Lowering her head to avert her eyes, her jaw dropped at what she saw. She was standing up. While she wasn't paralysed or anything like that it had still been almost a month since she had last stood on her own two feet. Her last episode had left her so drained in body and spirit that she just hadn't found the energy. Tentatively, she took a step forward. Her legs screamed back at her but she promptly ignored them. Shaking all over, still clutching the medicine bottle in her right hand she forced the other foot forward. The swingset was just a few feet away. Nagisa set her jaw. She could make it.

She didn't. On the next step, her legs buckled under her. With a yelp, she collapsed onto the dirt, sending the bottle flying. Razor-sharp pebbles dug their way into her palms and knees, drawing blood. In humiliation, she crawled in the dirt back to her wheelchair and somehow managed to heave herself onto it.

It was all wishful thinking, all make-believe. She would never have a child. Her body was useless, all withered and dried up. And even it wasn't she was too weak for something like that. Not to mention it wasn't really something she could accomplish by herself. The more she thought about it, the more she came to realize the medicine didn't really change a thing. These things had been lost to her a long time ago. Wiping a single tear from her eyes Nagisa picked up the medicine bottle from the ground, unscrewed the bottle cap and picked up a single white pill.

"Nagisa should put that down," came a growl from the bushes. Nagisa jumped, almost dropping the bottle. A pair of angry golden eyes stepped out into the light.

"Not you again."

"That thing is poison. It is death. Fuko knows this."

Nagisa didn't know which was worse. If the little girl was a figment of her imagination or if she was real. Either way, she had absolutely zero regards for Nagisa's privacy. And her many and repeated objections had most definitely fallen on deaf ears. The girl could pop up anywhere. In the garden. In Nagisa's room. In the bath. When she wasn't scolding Nagisa for not being pregnant yet she usually went on long nonsensical rants about the supposed excellence of starfish.

"Go away."

The girl looked hurt. She always looked hurt whenever Nagisa rejected her ideas or wanted to get rid of her.

"Fuko will go away if Nagisa gives Fuko that," she pointed an accusing finger at the medicine bottle.

"Why?"

"Fuko already told Nagisa that. It means death."

"This is medicine. It will help me, not harm me."

"It is evil. It will kill the Nagisa that should have been. And it will kill Ushio."

Colors danced at the edge of Nagisa vision at the mention of that name.

"That doesn't make sense. You can't kill something that doesn't exist."

"Fuko always makes perfect sense. Nagisa is just being stubborn. Give it to Fuko!" The girl stretched out one hand in and put the other on her hip. She was so sure she would get her will. Why wouldn't she? Everyone got their will with Nagisa. All she ever did was to roll over. And she was so tired of it.

"No." Nagisa raised her hand towards her mouth while keeping her eyes on the girl.

An expression of utter terror washed over the girl and she bolted with shocking speed towards Nagisa and threw herself at the much larger girl without any concern whatsoever for herself.

"No! Nagisa mustn't!" The girl clung like a monkey to Nagisa's arm and furiously tried to pry open her hand to get the pill out. When Nagisa wouldn't open her fist the girl opened her mouth and sank a set of surprisingly sharp teeth into Nagisa's arm. Nagisa yelped in surprise as the little girl snapped the pill right out of her hand with a victorious grin. But in the commotion the girl with the golden eyes lost her balance, falling backwards with flailing arms onto the hard street. Even so, the first thing she did when she was landed was to smash the white pill into the dirt, crushing it. Dusting herself off with a grim smile the girl got to her feet again. One down.

But her smile faded when her eyes fell on Nagisa again. For in the meanwhile the older girl had produced another pill from the bottle and was now holding it an inch from her mouth, eyes wide in fury.

"Don't come closer! I'll do it!"

"Nagisa must listen to Fuko! Nagisa must do as Fuko says!"

"Stop telling me what to do!" Nagisa screeched down at the girl. "You don't know me!" Panting Nagisa's eyes shot daggers. The little girl looked miserable as she cowed under Nagisa's fury.

"You know what my parents had to go through to get me this medicine? They have given up their entire lives and any chance of happiness for me. And you want me to just throw all that away?"

Fuko just glared stubbornly back up at her.

"For what? Some made up child!"

"Ushio is not made up! Fuko remembers her!"

"And I'm her mother? So who's the father then?"

Fuko opened her mouth as if to speak but then closed it again, instead clenching her jaw tight.

"No one that's who!" Nagisa laughed a mirthless laugh.

"Have you seen me? Huh?" She tore off her hat with her free hand, revealing a head with only sparse patches of hair left. The little girl looked shocked at the sight.

"Fuko thinks Nagisa is beautiful. Fuko has always thought so," the girl on the ground finally muttered, eyes lowered.

"You can't even look at me! You think someone would want to marry me?"

Fuko looked up again, her eyes a mix of fire and sadness. "There is nothing Fuko is more sure of."

"You think someone would want to...to...with this?" Nagisa hands gestured at her gaunt form, a disgusted grimace upon her face. Not waiting for an answer, she shook her head furiously.

"No. No, I will not dishonour my parents' sacrifice by giving in to some ludicrous fantasy." She held up the pill so that the streetlight fell upon it, turning it over between her fingers.

"I only wish this pill was indeed poison so that their misery could end before I drive them out of their home and onto the streets." And with that, she swallowed the pill whole.

"Nooooo!" Fuko screamed, desperately stumbling her way towards Nagisa on all fours. The light in her golden eyes seemed to fade as it gave way to utter hopelessness. Coldly Nagisa turned her wheelchair around and started to roll away.

"No! It can't end like this! Fuko won't let it!" the girl screeched behind Nagisa.

"You don't even exist," Nagisa told herself, increasing her speed.

"Fuko does exist! Fuko is real! And so is Ushio!"

Just like last time the name caused colours to bloom before Nagisa's eyes. But this time she didn't embrace the vision, instead ruthlessly pushing it aside while propelling her wheelchair forward with all her might. She didn't care where she was going, she only wanted to get away.

"None of this is real, none of it," she muttered to herself. Nagisa pinched her eyes shut, closing off the outside world. Her ragged breath was burning a hole in her chest. Her palms were raw and her arms felt like they were ready to fall off. Yet somehow she managed to increase her speed even further. Rattling and shaking, the wheelchair raced forward.

"Stop! Nagisa! No, stop!" The voice was further away now, yet it seemed even more desperate.

"It's all in my head, all in my head-"

Then came the sound of screeching tires against the asphalt. Nagisa's eyes flew open straight into two blinding lights. There was a loud bang and for a moment she could fly.

Like a soft wet blanket, darkness closed in on Nagisa Furukawa from all sides.

* * *

Lights. Sound. Pain.

"Female. Early twenties. Struck by a hit and run. Concussion, possible spinal injury and internal bleeding." Someone forced Nagisa's eyes open and shone a bright light on them.

"Normal pupillary response. That's promising. You carried her the whole way here?"

"Yes," said another voice. It was coarse and deep, a voice Nagisa had never heard before. Yet the sound of it was the most familiar and comforting thing that had ever fallen upon her ears.

"So you witnessed the accident?"

"No. Someone...someone came to get me."

"I see, can you please set her down? We need to examine her properly."

"I'm trying," said the comforting rough voice. "But she won't let go."

Of course Nagisa refused to let go. She clung fast like her life depended on it. This was home, she instinctively knew it. Finally, after all the struggle she had gone through she had finally found her way. Not even when she was little and Akio had carried her around on his shoulders had she felt so at home as she did right now. Let go? Never. Only here did she belong. This must be heaven.

But if that was the case, why did heaven smell like urine and cheap whiskey?

"Nagisa!" A door flew open and two diffuse familiar shapes rushed towards her.

"Mom?" Nagisa tried to open her eyes properly. Several men in white rushed in to keep the newcomers away.

"Please don't touch her! We don't know if her spine has been damaged. Are you her parents?"

"Yes," said another voice, thick with emotion.

"Dad?"

"Your daughter has been in an accident," said a man in white next to her.

"We are lucky she got here so quickly. This man probably saved her life. But right not it is imperative that we examine her. She needs to let go. Can you see if you can talk to her?"

Nagisa looked up. Someone was looking back down at her, past her eyes and straight into her soul. Beyond a dirty beard, two hard and worn eyes lit up like a christmas tree when they saw her. Nagisa Furukawa, with her skeletal body and balding head. No one had ever looked at her like that. For the first time in years, she smiled.

"Nagisa, honey. You need to let go," came her mother's voice from far away.

Only with great reluctance did Nagisa slowly release her grip on the man's overcoat. With the greatest care, as if there was nothing more important to him in this world, he slowly started to lower her onto the stretcher next to them. All the while he never took his eyes off Nagisa. And she couldn't take her eyes off him. For what else were they to do when they had lived their whole adult lives split right down the middle and finally in one moment of perfect clarity suddenly became whole again?

They two of them simply stared at each other in disbelief as the nurses carefully started to wheel Nagisa away. Without thinking, she stretched out her hand towards the homeless man. And without thinking he stretched his hand right back.

"Has she taken any medicines we should know about?" The lead doctor, a young man with blond hair prompted Sanae. He stretched his hands out forward so that a nurse could help into his green scrubs.

"Yes," Sanae showed the doctor the prescription she had received that very morning. The young doctor frowned and snorted in obvious disapproval as he read the piece of paper. He quickly followed Nagisa's stretcher with brisk steps, whispering to the nurse that has helped him into his clothes.

"I'm not taking any chances. Pump her stomach. Stat."

"Yes, doctor."

Not until Nagisa disappeared into the examination room did the homeless man look up, a dazed look on his rugged face. Tentatively he took a step towards the examination room before remembering himself and stopping before Sanae and Akio. As soon as Nagisa had disappeared from sight Sanae all but collapsed on her knees before the man, head lowered, tears streaming from her face.

"How can we ever thank you? You saved our daughter. Our only daughter."

"It was nothing" the homeless man grumbled, averting his eyes and shifting around uncomfortably. As Sanae cried on the floor the spell broke and the man's face hardened again. He turned around and started to walk away. But he soon found his way blocked by a baseball bat. Turning around he locked eyes with the bat's wielder.

"It was _not_ nothing," Akio said gravely. "It was everything." The homeless man nodded in recognition and Akio nodded with him before lowering his bat again. Stuffing his hands into the pockets of his filthy coat the homeless man started to shuffle towards the exit.

"Hey, brat. What's your name?" Akio called after him.

Turning around one last time, the homeless man scratched his head as if he might have forgotten it. After a while, he cleared his throat and spoke with a voice, clearer and stronger than before.

"Tomoya. My name is Tomoya."

Amongst all the commotion no one seemed to notice the small girl as she slipped out of the examination room the doctors had rolled Nagisa into. Quick as lightning she darted down the hallway and into an empty bathroom. Once inside she produced a bottle of pills from her pocket. For a moment she held the bottle in her bruised hands, red puffy eyes glaring at it in utter contempt before gleefully opening the bottle and pouring its contents into the toilet bowl.

"Never bet against Fuko," the girl spat viciously at the pills as she flushed the toilet, watching the tiny white specks swirling down into the sewers with grim satisfaction.

"For, in the end, Fuko always gets what Fuko wants."

 _Author's note: Man, I really went all in on the emotional battering ram concept with this one. Did it work or was it just an angsty belly flop?_

 _You tell me._


	4. Why aren't you knocked up yet?

Nagisa knew she was dreaming. The spring wind was playing in her hair, caressing her face, threatening to lift her skirt. Smiling, she kept her eyes closed, not wanting to leave the moment. She wanted to stay in this world where real problems didn't exist, where her greatest fear was that someone might catch a glimpse of her underwear. The smell of spring in the air, the feeling of cherry blossom petals brushing up against her, the sounds of laughter in the air made all the old memories come flooding back. Nagisa wriggled her toes, feeling the familiar inside of her formal shoes. Her itching kneehigh socks, the skirt that was always too short, her jacket that was always too hot, even the uncomfortable straps of her bra, digging into her shoulders. In the real world, Nagisa hadn't worn a bra in years, her withered frame was no longer in need of that kind of support. Nor did she have any hair left for the wind to play with.

In the dream she trembling raised a hand towards her head and pulled down a stray lock of hair in front of her face. The smell of mom's shampoo filled her nostrils. She let go of the lock and let her hand wander down her face and neck until it reached her jacket. Her skin felt soft and warm, not like the parched and dry skin she knew she had these days. Sheepishly Nagisa let her hand wander further down and her breath caught in her throat. Even before her disease had robbed her of her female form she had always had a rather humble figure. But humble or not, now there was most definitely something there beneath her hand.

Nagisa could remember it all as if it was yesterday. She had been here before. Slowly she opened her eyes.

Before her eyes, the hill leading up to her old high school lay before her in a sea of brilliant colours. The bright green leaves, the soft pink cherry blossoms, the dazzling blue sky. Not able to contain herself Nagisa giggled girlishly. She remembered standing here, afraid to walk up the hill after having to redo her first year. She had been petrified with fear, with doubt, unable to take so much as a step. It had taken her three days to summon the courage to ascend the hill. She remembers how the teachers had scolded her.

This was supposed to be a place associated with so many negative things. Sickness, fear, failure. A nightmare. Yet it wasn't. This place was special to her, something wonderful had happened here. It felt like...

Like the place where her life had begun.

"You can't stay here."

Nagisa swung around. Behind her stood a boy, wearing a school uniform from the same school as her. He was a lot taller than Nagisa, with black unruly hair and a briefcase tossed over his shoulder. All in all, he looked like a normal boy. Except that where his face should be there was instead a ghostly white blur as if it's very existence had been wiped out.

"You have to go back. It's not safe for you here."

"Not safe?" Nagisa could not bring herself to believe his words. She had never felt so safe anywhere in her life. Just as the world she lived in was wrong, something about this place was right.

"Just trust me."

And Nagisa found that she did, implicitly, without question. She reached up her hand up towards the boy's missing face.

"I know you."

He took a step backwards.

"No, you don't. We've never met." He spoke with such conviction as if trying to will his words to become reality.

Nagisa turned around, looking up the hill towards the school. It was like the veil was slowly lifting from her mind. Images were flashing through her mind. Walking up the hill. Eating lunch together. Being in a play. Playing baseball. Holding hands. Kis...

Kissing? Nagisa placed a finger on her lips. She had never been kissed yet she remembered the feeling of another pair of lips on hers. Day after day, night after night. She took a step closer to the boy.

"We have. You walked me up the hill on that first day. Don't you remember me?"

The question hit the boy like a punch in the gut. Nagisa could see him physically cringing. Nagisa reached out but the boy jumped back, his voice choking up, tears falling to the ground beneath the empty face.

"No! You stay away from me!"

Nagisa retracted, scared and hurt. Upon seeing her reaction the boy instinctively took a step towards her, reaching out a hand as if to comfort her. But he quickly backed off again. The previously so vibrant colours were turning dark and grey around them.

"You don't understand! If you stay here if you continue down this path it will be the death of you! You're so much better off without me. I'll bring you only death and misery, it's all I'm good for."

Raising an arm to wipe the tears of his faceless features the boy turned around and started to walk briskly up the hill.

"Wait! No! Don't leave me!" Nagisa screamed after him. But all around her, the dream was collapsing. She stumbled after him but her legs betrayed her, sending her tumbling to her knees. Desperately reaching for the faceless boy she was catapulted back into consciousness.

* * *

Nagisa opened her eyes. The room shimmered into view before her eyes. She was lying in a hospital bed with white lines surrounded by a blue plastic curtain. From somewhere she could feel a warm afternoon breeze and the sound of bird chatter. The small section seemed empty except for...

Oh no.

"Ha! They thought Nagisa might never wake up but Fuko knew better! Are you pregnant now?" The golden eyed girl demanded, standing up from the chair next to the bed and pointing straight towards Nagisa.

"Pregnant? What? No!" Nagisa blurted out.

"When a boy and girl hugs the girl gets pregnant, isn't that how it works?"

"No!"

"Hmmm, Fuko admits she is unsure about the details. If hugging is not enough then Nagisa must explain to Fuko how to make her pregnant. Fuko will do whatever it takes!"

Nagisa pulled the sheet around her protectively.

"No one will be doing anything to me!"

"The other Nagisa was also a prude. Fuko had to help her out. Nagisa should be thankful that Fuko is always there to help her out."

Fragments of the accident were creeping back into Nagisa's mind. The headlights and screeching tired of the car, the little girl standing over her screaming at her to stay awake and...two arms carrying her away.

"You saved my life," Nagisa breathed.

For once the little girl didn't seem to immediately know what to say. She looked at her feet, mumbling and shaking her head.

"Fuko didn't."

"Then how did I get here?"

"Fuko went to get help."

"I thought no one else could see you?"

"My archenemy can."

"Your archenemy? You mean the homeless man in the alley? Is he...also here?" Nagisa asked carefully, looking around.

"No, he's long gone." Fuko shook her head in regret.

"Why would he help me?"

"Like Nagisa, he has forgotten himself. But there are things that can't be forgotten no matter how much you try. Like Ushio."

Nagisa sighed. None of it made any sense. Yet something had been familiar about that embrace. She closed her eyes and for a second remembered the feeling of completeness, of being whole again that she had felt as she was carried to the hospital. It must have been the drugs, she told herself.

"Tell me about her." Nagisa knew this wasn't real but she wanted to live the dream just a little while longer.

"About who?"

"About Ushio. About...my daughter."

Nagisa got nothing in response. As the silence stretched on at last Nagisa opened her eyes. The little golden-eyed girl was sitting with her eyes pinched shut, face all scrunched up, her hands to her temples, focusing intently.

"Uhm..." Nagisa started.

"Quiet! Fuko's thinking!" The girls snapped back at her. After another long silence, she finally spoke in a sulky voice.

"She's very fun. Much more fun than Nagisa. And very good at playing. Much better than Nagisa. And very pretty. Much prettier than Nagisa."

"Well, that doesn't mean much" Nagisa sighed, her curiosity washed away with her usual resentment. The golden eyed girl looked up.

"Nagisa doesn't understand. Fuko thinks Nagisa is the most beautiful girl in this world."

"But you just said-"

"It's the only way Fuko could express how much she loves Ushio."

Nagisa blushed.

"Anything else?"

"Her hair is short. She likes fried rice. And the Big Dango Family."

"But...I like...I mean I used to like the Big Dango Family!" Nagisa blurted out, sitting up in the bed.

"Well of course! Where else would she get it from? Who likes the Big Dango Family these days? All the cool people like starfishes."

Nagisa studied the girl. She so wanted to believe it all. To believe that she had something in life to look forward to except being the guinea pig for various unscrupulous medical companies. Could it really be true? Could she really become a mother? Have a little daughter with someone who loved her? It was so tempting, yet she knew it was all a lie, a figment of her imagination. The golden-eyed girl waved her hands in front of Nagisa absent eyes.

"Fuko doesn't like it when Nagisa just stops like that." The girl cleared her throat and raised a finger. 'If you can move-'"

"'If you can move forward, then you should.'" Nagisa finished the sentence.

Then her eyes widened. "I remember those words. Who said that?"

Fuko smiled victoriously from ear to ear, pointing at Nagisa, knowing she had won this round.

"Nagisa did."

Nagisa took a deep breath. Why was she fighting this girl when everything she said rung so true in her ears? What did she really have to lose? Why was she clinging to this lifestyle that she so despised? Why was it so hard to accept that there might be something better out there? And what would her parents say if they saw her acting like this, all ungrateful and spiteful against someone who just wanted to help? The last part sealed the deal.

"I think we got started on the wrong foot. My name is Nagisa Furukawa." Nagisa bowed the best she could sitting in the bed. "I'm pleased to meet you. What's your name?"

"Fuko's name is Fuko Ikubi," responded the girl, also bowing.

"That's a beautiful name," Nagisa smiled. The muscles in her face felt stale and weird, yet it felt good to smile. The curtains of the window fluttered and the sun flooded into the room, bathing Nagisa's face in sunlight. For a split second, her shadow on the wall shifted, showing two distinct long locks of hair waving in the wind. When the moment faded her head was bald again, but her smile was still there.

"Thank you Fuko. Thank you for not giving up on me."

The little girl's face trembled for a second. Then she threw herself heedlessly at Nagisa, hugging her so tight that it hurt. But it hurt in a good way.

"Fuko knew Nagisa was still in there! Fuko has missed Nagisa so much!" Fuko sobbed in Nagisa's hospital gown.

Nagisa patted Fuko on the back, leaning her cheek against the crying little girl. Anger and disappointment flooded through her. In herself, in what she had done with her life these last few years. She had the strongest feeling that in giving up, in surrendering in the way she had done she was somehow betraying...her own memory.

She started to realized what Fuko had meant by the "other Nagisa". Out there, somewhere, there had been a Nagisa that hadn't given up but instead stood strong and died fighting. But where had that Nagisa got such strength, such a fierce lust for life from?

Clenching her jaw and tightening her fist, Nagisa nodded to herself. It didn't matter. If that Nagisa could do it, so could she. If fate deemed she had to die, she would not go quietly. She would go down kicking and screaming, to her very last breath.

Not realizing she was also crying she kissed Fuko on her head.

"Me too. I missed me too."


	5. All your fault

The manager of the store walked back and forth across the floor, annoyance radiating from him like heat off a furnace. He glared at the young man standing just outside the dressing rooms and pointed towards his watch. It was ten minutes past six and he had already told the young man that the store was closing twice. The young man bowed apologetically, smiled nervously back as he leaned in closer towards the curtain separating the dressing room from the rest of the store.

"Nagisa, you have to come out sometime," he tried in his softest voice.

"No, it's too embarrassing!" Came a squeaky response from behind the curtain. The young man could just barely make out the vague figure of a girl behind it. She was standing with her arms clutched over her chest, shaking her head vigorously.

Across the store, the manager stamped his foot down hard. The young man swallowed hard and steeled himself.

"Well, if you won't come out then I'll just have to come in!"

The was a small pause before the girl spoke again.

"That...that's alright. As long as it is only you, Tomoya-kun. But you will have to promise to close your eyes!"

The boy put a hand in front of his eyes.

"I promise!"

"Ok, you can come in."

Awkwardly the young man slipped behind the curtain, his right hand clasped firmly over his eyes.

"I was silly to think I could wear something like this. We should not have come here. This is a store for pretty girls." The girl sounded miserable.

"You are a pretty girl!"

"You...you really think so?"

"I do! The prettiest of them all! Now can I please remove my hand?"

"O...ok," she stammered. The boy lowered his hand and opened his eyes.

"Wha… what do you think?"

She was wearing a white bikini dotted with what looked like round, pink little balls of various sizes with smiling faces on them. The young man's jaw dropped. He tried to speak but no words came out. It was all he could do to stop his tongue from lolling out of his mouth like a dog. The girl promptly turned scarlet.

 _You'd like to remember her like that, don't you? Beautiful, vibrant and alive. What about this?_

The scene shifted and the same girl wearing the same bikini was standing in the ocean on a summer day. She squealed in delight as the young man splashed a wave of water at her. He tried very hard to look her in the face and avoid staring at the droplets of water rolling down her body.

 _That was a good day. But not as good a day as this, right?_

It was now dark outside and the couple were indoors. They were sitting on a bed in a tiny one-room apartment, their eyes and hearts locked together in silence. The girl's heart was pounding so hard the boy could almost hear it. Her eyes were wide and full of expectation, her breathing fast and shallow. Ever so slowly the boy leaned in closer to her and with trembling hands undid the top button of her pyjamas.

 _Oh yeah, that got your blood pumping, didn't it? And speaking of blood, remember this?_

The girl was now lying on the same bed with her eyes closed. Her hair was lank, sticking to her head. Her face was covered in sweat, her hand lay limply next to her. There was blood everywhere. Somewhere in the room, a baby was crying. Outside, beyond the windows, a snowstorm was raging. Right next to the bed, a woman who looked very much like the girl was sobbing in utter despair. For the girl on the mattress wasn't breathing.

 _She was the best thing that ever happened to you and this is how you repaid her. You knew she was weak, you knew she was sick. Deep down you knew her body couldn't take it. Yet knowing all that you still climbed into bed with her time and time again to satisfy your base desires, to sate your lust for her body. And it killed her._

 _You murdered her._

"NOOOOOOO!"

Tomoya woke with a start, covered in sweat, yet shaking in the bitter cold of the back alley. It was well past midnight and the wind was howling viciously, stripping him of what little warmth he had been able to muster. Desperately he fumbled for the bottle of whiskey and in one gulp downed the whole bottle. In horror, he looked at the empty bottle and started to sob uncontrollably.

More, he needed more. Much more. He needed to drink until he was so numb that he couldn't feel anything anymore. Only then could he handle the pain, only then could he keep the ghostly memories at bay.

Yet no matter how much he drank, no matter how much he tried to shut it out, every time he closed his eyes there she was, smiling that smile at him. That beautiful girl that haunted his dreams. He had never seen her, never met her, yet he knew her in the most intimate of ways. The way her hair smelled, the touch of her skin, the small noises she made she slept. What she liked to eat, what she liked to do, the songs she sang, how...how she liked to be touched. The details of the dream were already fading, but her face, it always lingered.

But along with these sweet memories came an overwhelming sense of loss, regret and guilt. This girl he had never met, and yet he had somehow managed to destroy her life. He was so certain he had been the cause of her death. Every night he was reminded that he had murdered the most beautiful thing he had ever seen.

Tomoya roared and threw the bottle into the wall with all his might. A rain of glass fell down on the dark alley. One large jagged shard landed near his hand. With, shaking hands Tomoya gripped it in his hands. He had no money, even for the cheapest drink. But there was a liquor store down the street.

Could he really do that? He imagined the clerk, a young girl just out of high school, shaking in fear as he screamed and brandished the shard at her. With his other hand, he traced the edge of the glass, drawing a drop of scarlet blood. He had never been god's best child, but could he really spill the blood of an innocent to fuel his addiction?

Slowly, with a tired smile, Tomoya put down the shard. No, even now, as low as he had fallen, he could never do that. He curled up against the wall and tried his best to cover his body with the newspapers he had been able to collect again. On this night, there would be no drink to help ease the pain. He would have to fight the nightmares on his own.

But he was losing and losing badly. He didn't know if he could handle another night. Tentatively he glanced down at the shard again, glinting menacingly in the faint light. Then he lifted his bleeding finger in front of his face.

Perhaps there was another way. Another way to end the pain. One where he didn't have to hurt anyone else. A way that ensured that he could never hurt anyone ever again. With trembling hands, he reached for the shard again.

But before he could reach it a whirlwind of grey hair and golden eyes stormed into the alley. The glass shard got kicked into a corner in the commotion.

"You have to come! She's hurt! A car hit her! You must come now! Now!" The girl with the golden eyes screamed at him, shaking him in desperation and fury and, despite the immense difference in size, pulling him to his feet by the sheer force of her will.

"What? Who?" Tomoya answered in a daze.

She told him. And even though he was positive he had never met a person with that name, suddenly nothing else mattered.


	6. Date night

"Auch! What the hell are we doing here?" Tomoya hissed as he dragged a thorn from the palm of his hand. When he looked up a branch slapped right into his face as Fuko carelessly made her way through the bushes ahead of him. She snorted, shook her head and tutted in disappointment.

"Always complaining. Fuko's sister always said to Fuko: Always ask nicely if you want a nice answer."

"Ok, can you _please_ tell me what all this is for?"

"Fuko thought that was obvious." She tilted her head and gave Tomoya a sympathetic look. "You must not be very smart."

"There is nothing obvious with crawling around in the bushes outside a hospital!"

Fuko rolled her eyes and sighed in exasperation.

"Does Fuko have to explain everything? People ask too many questions if you sneak around outside the bushes. Duh!" Fuko popped up her head like a periscope to get her bearings. The sunset was almost upon them. For the last fifteen minutes or so Fuko had guided him through the hospital garden, dashing between bushes deeper into the complex. Now they were poised behind a hedge on a slope leading down to one of the many low buildings in the park. A faint light was streaming out from one of the open windows, strong enough to compete with the quickly fading sun.

"Why do we have to sneak around at-"

"Shhh! We're here!" The little golden-eyed girl was staring intently forward out of the bushes, gesturing Tomoya forward. Grumbling he crawled up next to her.

"What could possibly be worth-"

"That." Fuko pointed forward.

Tomoya squinted into the open window. Inside the open window, there was a girl. But not just any girl. Last time they had met, when he had rushed her to the hospital, it had been dark and she had looked so fragile and sick that he had not recognized her. It had been weeks since that fateful night where both Tomoya and Nagisa had been close to leaving the world for good. Yet he could never forget that face.

Sweat was streaming down Nagisa's face. With gritted teeth, she had pinned herself up between two rails, holding herself up with her arms while slowly taking step after tentative step. Right beside her was a male hospital nurse in a white coat, guiding her forward with encouraging words, ever ready to catch her if she would stumble.

"Just like that. Slow and steady. Very good."

Two-thirds of the way down the rails Nagisa's left arm folded under her and she collapsed on the floor between the rails. The nurse immediately rushed in to assist her but she waved him off. For a moment she just sat there in a bundle on the floor. Then slowly, with ragged breaths, she grabbed the rails and started to pull herself up. What little muscle she had strained taut as she struggled to get to her feet. The nurse looked unsure like he was internally debating whether to rush in despite the girl's wish. Just when he opened his mouth to speak Nagisa heaved with all her pathetic might and just about managed to get up on one knee. Willing herself forward, Nagisa forced her legs to move and slowly started to rise.

Sadly will alone was not enough. Halfway up she lost the grip on the rail and was yet again sent sprawling to the floor. On the way down her left wrist struck the railing with an audible clang. She whimpered in pain. The nurse swore under his breath and face full of regret rushed to her side, examining her arm.

"It's just a bruise. You just stay there, I'll get the wheelchair."

"NO!" Nagisa screamed, panting hard and clutching her bruised arm.

"I'm sorry. I mean, I don't want the wheelchair. I just need a little help to get up." She looked up at the nurse, wide amber eyes begging him to listen. "Please?"

The nurse paused for a moment, his forehead contracting in a frown.

"I really think-"

"One more try. Just one. I know I can make it."

Not waiting for his response, Nagisa clung the nurse's arms, slowly shifting her weight onto him while starting to pull herself to her feet again. He had no choice but to oblige her, for without his support she would surely fall back onto the floor. Nagisa knew this. In fact, she was counting on it. After was seemed like an eternity, she once again stood upright, hands on the rails. Shaking from head to toe, she shuffled one of her feet forward. Then the other. Step by step, she inched forward.

Finally, with great effort, she made it to the end of the rails. Glancing over her shoulder, Nagisa's mouth hung slightly open as if she was astounded that she had made it this far. The nurse smiled and shook his head, giving Nagisa a thumbs up. From the other end of the room came the sound of excited clapping. Sanae rose from a chair, face just barely composed, beaming with pride and joy. She strode over with as much dignity as she could muster, her step so quick it was almost a jog. Stopping before the nurse, she bowed low.

"Thank you for all you have done for my daughter, we will be forever in your debt."

"I've done nothing," the nurse mumbled, scratching his head, clearly embarrassed. "Your daughter is very strong, you should be very proud of her."

Sanae turned to Nagisa, dabbing at the corner of her eyes with a handkerchief while swallowing hard. Nagisa smiled back, clearly exhausted yet somehow with an aura of energy around her.

"I am. More so than any words could ever convey."

"Mom..." Nagisa turned scarlet.

"Eh...I will just store this away then," the nurse strode over to Nagisa's wheelchair and patted the handles. "Seems like we won't be needing it today." He nodded to them both and retreated to the far side of the room, offering them some privacy. Nagisa remained standing at the end of the rails. She looked like now that she was able to stand, she never wanted to sit down again. Sanae knew better than to offer her a chair.

"So, dad couldn't make it today?" Nagisa started, shifting uncomfortably under the rays of joy breaming from her mother's eyes. Sanae's smiled faltered for a fraction of a second. Her eyes flickered around the room as she pondered whether to lie to her daughter. In the end, she decided not to.

"He had to go to the bank, but he will be here tomorrow," she said shortly. Nagisa opened her mouth to respond, but before she could speak Sanae shifted topic.

"He will be so excited when he hears of this! I will have to bake some special bread to celebrate!" Sanae winked at her.

Nagisa couldn't help but giggle. It was the same old tired joke her parents always played out. Sanae would bake the most outrageous pastries and Akio would try to convince everyone that it was the best things ever. All the while secretly whispering to Nagisa behind her back to play along. As long as she could remember that charade had made her laugh. Not until now, when she was grown up, did she realise it had been all been to simply keep her spirits up when she had been sick and alone. Nagisa painfully straightened her back and smiled back at her mother. She would make them proud, she swore it. She would honour all that they had done for her. No matter the cost.

"Please tell him I will be home to play baseball with him again before he knows it."

They shared a hug so long that it was only interrupted when the nurse sheepishly pointed out that visiting hours ended twenty minutes ago.

"I will be back tomorrow, I promise. We both will. Do you have everything you need here? Is there anything I can bring with me? Except for my special bread, of course!"

Nagisa chuckled. "No mum, I'm fine." But just as Sanae was poised to leave, Nagisa caught her by her sleeve.

"Wait...actually there is one thing..." Nagisa squirmed, suddenly glancing at her feet. Without thinking, she pressed her thighs together, almost toppling over but steading herself at the last moment.

"What is it?" Sanae asked, eager to give her daughter whatever she wanted.

Nagisa looked up, swallowing hard while turning slightly red. Her face almost matched the short straws of hair sticking up from her scalp.

"Nagisa, darling. You can tell me anything. Please, whatever it is, I will do my very best to get it for you. If you're worried about money..."

"It's not that!"

"Then what is it?" Worry started to creep onto Sanae's previously happy smile. The lines in her face started to show again. Nagisa took a deep breath, closing her eyes for a moment before looking her mother straight in the eyes.

"I don't know, but I...I might need you to get something for me. Something...from the bathroom..." She tried, her eyes urgently trying to convey the meaning behind her words.

"Of course, honey. What is it you need? Your favourite towel? Your old soap?" Sanae started. Nagisa blushed and looked down again, biting her lip. Once upon a time, she might have left it at that. Or perhaps at least whispered. But that time was passed, she didn't have time for that anymore.

"Tampons mum. I need tampons."

"But...but...but.." Sanae stuttered. "Are you sure?"

Nagisa just nodded. Sanae stood dumbstruck for a moment like she didn't understand what her daughter had just said. "You haven't for years...and the doctor said you would never...that the pills would take away..."

"I'm not taking those pills Mum."

"What? But..."

"I got rid of them. I don't want them."

"But you're so much better. I haven't seen you like this in years...I thought..." Tears started falling down Sanae's cheeks. With great effort, Nagisa took a step towards her mother. She straightened her back, standing face to face with her mother who could do nothing but gape at her daughter's transformation. While her body had certainly changed these last few weeks, with her ribs no longer showing through her clothes and her previously bald head now looking like a freshly mown lawn of red-brown grass, the greatest change was in her eyes. There was a spark there that Sanae had thought was gone forever. Nagisa had never been a difficult child, most often doing what she was told, but when she really made up her mind about something Sanae had quickly learned that there was little use in getting between her gentle daughter and what she had set her sights on. So much like her father, she couldn't help thinking.

How could we have made such a beautiful creature? Sanae thought to herself. Such a wonder, that had taken the best of each of them into herself. Nagisa had Sanae's calm grace together with Akio's fierce fire. A fire she had not seen in years. But now it was back, burning stronger than ever. Unable to contain herself, Sanae threw herself into Nagisa's arms, sobbing loudly. It was all her daughter could do to stay standing.

"I know mum, I know. I'm sorry. But I think I have learned something. I think I'm the only one who can make me better. Now that I know that, I won't go back to being that person again. Never again."

"I love you Nagisa. I love you so much. I'm so proud of you."

"Mum, you're crushing me."

"Sorry, sorry." Sanae reluctantly disentangled from her daughter.

"So you'll bring the..." Nagisa left the sentence hanging. Her mother jumped to action.

"Yes of course. I will be right back." She rushed across the room towards the door, hastily bowing to the nurse who smiled back awkwardly. "Please forgive my shameful behaviour and thank you once again for taking such good care of my daughter." And with that, she hurried out of the room.

The second Sanae left the room Nagisa sank back onto the rails. She stood there for a moment, head low, letting her breathing steady itself. The assistant scratched his head and cleared his throat before carefully addressing the exhausted and embarrassed girl.

"Perhaps it's best if we stop here for today."

Nagisa shook her head and with great effort turned around so she was facing the other way, back down the rails. She flashed him a tired yet determined smile. "No. I want to go again."

"Are you sure?"

"Yes." Her voice made it clear that the discussion was over. The nurse nodded, clearly pleased. Slowly he started to guide her down the rails. Nagisa gritted her teeth once again and took a trembling step.

"You're one determined young lady, Nagisa-chan. At this rate, we'll have you playing baseball with your dad in no time. Ok carefully now, one foot at a time..."

Outside the room, in the dusky hedge Fuko poked Tomoya with her elbow. Hard, like she always did.

"See? She isn't giving up. She's strong."

"She's amazing..."

"You're right, she IS amazing. Tomoya needs to remember that. You can not think she is weak. She needs to believe that she is strong. If you believe in her, then she can believe. Fuko knows it. Do you understand?"

"No, I don't understand! Listen here-"

Fuko didn't listen in the slightest. Inside Nagisa had finished yet another pass and was sipping from a bottle of water while the nurse slipped out the door, leaving her alone.

"This is your chance!" Fuko squeaked in excitement. Then she looked a Tomoya's coat, full of dirt and twigs. "Fuko thinks you could have dressed a little nicer for a date," she remarked pointedly.

"And who's fault is that I have spent the last half an hour crawling around in the bushes? Wait, what did you say? Date?"

"So rude! Fuko has no idea what you are talking about. Honestly, Fuko has no idea what Nagisa sees in you."

"I keep telling you, she doesn't see anything in me! She doesn't even know me. What...what am I supposed to say to her? What am I supposed to do?"

"Fuko has already told you! You're supposed to put a baby in her belly. Ushio!"

"You can't just walk up to a girl and ask her to bear your child!"

"You can't?" Fuko sounded confused.

"No!"

"Why?"

"Because...I mean...you see nice girls...they..." Tomoya tried to find the words. However, he wasn't fast enough for his grey-haired companion.

"Bah! As always, Fuko has to do everything." Fuko stood up behind the hedge, in full view of everybody. Taking a deep breath she started to wave her hands merrily towards the open window.

"Oi! Nagisa! Nagisa-chan! Over here!"

"What are you doing? She will hear us! We can't, I can't..."

Tomoya's stammering was interrupted when Fuko kicked him. Hard.

"Auch! Why did you do that for?"

"Because you're an idiot. Get it together. Don't screw this up."

Inside the room, a confused Nagisa glanced out the window to see what the commotion was about. She caught a glimpse of Fuko against the sunset, standing in the middle of the bushes, shouting and waving her arms. Nagisa smiled and waved. Fuko disappeared back into the shrubbery and violently dragged someone up off the ground, pushing him forward through the hedge with an amazing force for someone her size. The man stumbled forward, muttering and glaring and the golden-eyed girl, who was now so pleased with herself that she looked like she was about to burst. Abashed, he brushed the dirt and leaves off his dirty coat.

Then he looked up and his eyes met Nagisa's. Even as the sun sunk below the horizon behind them, a curtain was pulled off the grey and joyless world they both lived in, and like fireworks, the dusk around them erupted into brilliant colours. None of them seem to even notice Fuko as she skulked off into the night.


	7. Not awkward at all

For the first time since he had met her, Tomoya wished he had listened to the crazy golden-eyed girl. She had hammered it into him: Tonight, make sure you're clean, make sure you're dressed well. He hadn't listened. But it was all so easy for her to say, she didn't live in a dirty alley. Yet as he sat in the hospital bed next to the girl he had carried away from the hit and run, unwashed and reeking of sweat and stale alcohol he was almost overwhelmed by shame.

Tomoya regretted coming. What had he been thinking? This was all make-believe. What sane girl would want some disgusting hobo climbing through an open window into her room? Poor thing was probably scared witless he would hurt her. With a jerk, Tomoya rose from the bed.

"Are you leaving? You haven't even told me your name," the girl next to him squeaked.

"I'm a nobody, just a homeless alcoholic. I'm sorry I intruded upon you. I will leave now."

"NO! Don't!" She screamed, almost hysterically, desperately grabbing hold off Tomoya's dirty coat as her life depended on it. Shocked, Tomoya sat down next to her again.

"I'm...I'm sorry. I've never been very good at talking to people."

"Neither am I," he responded gruffly. "Most people are afraid to even look at me."

"When people talk to me, they only do so out of pity."

"So I guess we have that in common."

"I guess we do."

They both just sat there, until the awkward silence became so loud it was deafening. Tomoya bit his tongue and clenched his fists, still staring into the floor.

"I don't pity you."

"And I'm not afraid of you," the girl immediately responded.

Neither of the pair dared to look up, each still intently studying their own hands.

"My name is Furukawa Nagisa. N...nice to meet you." She turned her eyes towards the floor.

"Okazaki Tomoya," Tomoya grunted. Then he sighed, his shoulder dropping. "Look, I don't know what that girl has told you but you don't want me around. I'm a mess."

"I'm also a mess."

"Not like me. I live on the street and spend my days staring down the bottom of a bottle. I mean, you can smell me, right? No one should be forced to be around me. Least of all you."

There was a moment of silence.

"Do you drink a lot?" Nagisa whispered.

"Yes," Tomoya answered after a short time. It was impossible to lie to her.

"Then we'll have to do something about that." It was not a question, not a request. It was a decision she had made. Simple as that. Tomoya had no part of it. She had decided for him that he would stop drinking. Normally he hated it when people butted into his life, telling him what to do. But here and now, he felt only shame. Shame for presenting himself like this. Shame for having her take responsibility for his mistakes. Shame for making her worry.

"You don't owe me anything."

"That's not true. But I can understand if you don't want an unsightly, bumbling, crippled girl like me hanging around."

Tomoya glanced up at her from the corner of his eye and spoke from his heart.

"I think you're perfect."

"Th...that's not true! Besides, I bet you say that to all the young girls," she mumbled, blushing furiously. But somehow Tomoya could tell from the tone of her voice that she wasn't really upset by his words. She had always had a problem accepting compliments and easily got flustered. Big dramatic gestures made her uneasy. The trick was to sneak the complements in, usually with a joke.

"Ha, nice try, but you were born in 84. That makes you a year older than me. So it's not only appropriate but expected of me to give you praise, wouldn't you say? Senpai."

They chuckled together. Something very familiar, yet unseen, was gradually permeating the air in the room. As it turns out, some things in this world are so primal that, no matter how hard you might try, they can only be suppressed for so long.

"Noone has ever called me senpai before. I guess you're right. How did you know?"

Tomoya scratched his scruffy beard, a confused look on his face.

"Afterwards, I talked to your parents. I guess they must have told me." Yet, he had to admit it was strange, for he didn't remember talking about her age. "Or, I might have glanced it on your chart." That didn't sound right to him either, yet he found he didn't care.

"I really wish you would have stayed. I wanted to thank you for what you did for me."

She looked up and finally their eyes locked. They both found that once they looked into the eyes of the other, they could not look away. The rest of the room melted away around them, leaving only the two of them. When he looked at her Tomoya couldn't help but feel like he wasn't himself anymore. No that wasn't true. He was himself, just not the Tomoya who slept in alleys and drank cheap booze. With her, he was another Tomoya, one that made his current self seem like a sad caricature.

"It was nothing."

Nagisa shook her head.

"You carried me to safety. To be able to do something like that, even after the very same thing happened to your mother. All for me." She looked up at him, and her look was not one of embarrassment. It was pride. All of his life, no one had ever been proud of Tomoya.

"I would do anything for you," he said without thinking.

"I know," Nagisa smiled back, a smile from the very depths of her soul, full of quiet confidence. She shook her head and absentmindedly brushed two long strands of hair out of her face. Tomoya blinked, for the very next second, her hair was short again. Reality flickered before his very eyes. Tomoya's eyes went wide as she effortlessly rose from the bed and walked up to the open window, staring off into the setting sun.

"Come watch the sunset with me," she gestured.

Slowly, Tomoya walked up to her. Out of instinct, he picked up her hand in his, running his thumb against the back of her hand. She smiled and squeezed it back. As the sun disappeared beyond the horizon their fingers intertwined.

"I can't wait to come home again," Nagisa whispered, resting her head on his shoulder.

"We missed you so much," Tomoya answered. That made no sense. And why did he say we? Tomoya lived alone in an alley. But most of all: Why had he missed a girl he had never met before so much that now that he was finally with her, the rest of his life seemed like a distant horror story. Yet with her by his side, he felt like he could finally breathe again.

"I will be home soon, I promise. Even if it means I have to crawl home."

"Don't say that. The most important thing is that you recover."

"I know, I know. It's just, I hadn't realized how much I missed you. The thought of you leaving me alone here..."

"I will never leave you."

She squeezed his hand extra hard and glanced up at him, her eyes were full of expectation. Slowly, her lips parted slightly. He knew that look, he knew what she wanted. In one glance, he instinctively knew her heart, like they had spent a lifetime together. They both nervously glanced around, and satisfied no one was watching, started to lean in against each other.

At that very moment, the speaker system crackled to life. The pair of them jumped at the sudden interruption.

"Visiting hours are over, all visitors are kindly asked to make their way towards the nearest exit. Thank you for your visit."

They both burst out giggling. It felt like they had been caught in the act. Nagisa looked up, a twinkle in her eye.

"I guess that'll have to wait," she teased.

"I guess so."

They shared one last moment together before Tomoya resigned himself to leave. But just as he was about to leave something popped up in his mind.

"Can I ask you something?" The question had been at the back of Tomoya's mind the whole time, like an itch that he needed to scratch.

"Anything."

"How did you know mom died in a car crash?" Tomoya himself didn't know that. His father had never talked about the death of his mother.

Nagisa absentmindedly shrugged her shoulders, letting the wind play in her hair.

"Your grandmother told me all about her, that weekend we were up at her place for Ushio's birthday. I remember thinking that I would so much have liked to meet her. Oh, I forgot to tell you: We're out of milk, could you swing by the supermarket after you pick Ushio up from school tomorrow? By the way, where is she?"

"Who?" That name again. It knocked the breath right out of him. Something was very wrong.

"Ushio! Didn't you bring her with you? I want to hug her before you have to leave. Did you leave her with mom? No wait, that can't be, mom was just here. Wait..."

Puzzled by the contradiction, Nagisa turned around to look around. Then her face turned ash white. She looked down at her feet and her legs started to shake. Just barely managing to remain standing, Nagisa's eye flickered across the rehabilitation room as if she had just entered it for the first time, raw terror shining from her eyes.

"No, no. None of this is right. This isn't how it's supposed to be."

She looked up at Tomoya, blinking in confusion, then reaching up with a trembling hand to feel his face.

"I...I know you."

 _Get away from her._

Tomoya drew away from the girl like her touch was fire, nearly toppling her over. She reached after him.

"You...we went to school together."

 _It's happening again. Get away from her._

"I...you...we...we were friends, weren't we?"

 _Now, quickly! Before you hurt her again._

Tomoya stumbled backwards, almost tripping over a chair. Nagisa advanced relentlessly on him, her weakness as if forgotten.

"No...not friends. We..."

She reached up and touched her lips, mouth wide with amazement. Then gently, her hand dropped to her stomach. She patted it in a smooth circle and looked down, closing her eyes. When she looked up again, her eyes were full of pain. Images of things that she clearly remembered yet that had never happened raced through her mind. Overwhelmed, she gradually crumpled onto the floor.

"Our daughter. Where is our little girl?"

 _This is your doing, bringer of pain and death. That's all you ever had to offer her. If you care for her, even in the slightest, you have to stay away from her. Go. Now!_

Tomoya turned around and ran as fast as he could out of the room, leaving the love of his life alone on the floor behind him, helplessly sobbing to herself.


	8. Buried in a white grave

Imagine a field of snow, so wide that it hurts the eye to even try to find an end to it. With a sky as white and featureless as the ground. Imagine a wind so bitterly cold that it doesn't just suck the warmth from you, it even sucks whatever hope you might have of ever being warm again. Imagine a land where nothing lives, where nothing moves, where time itself has surrendered to the cold. Now, imagine a lone golden-eyed girl fighting her way across this land, muttering to herself with every step through the snow.

After a particularly vicious gale throws the girl to her knees, she glares up at the sky, brandishing her fist up at the heavens. "Fuko has decided. Fuko hates the cold. Do you hear that, nasty rude white world? Fuko hates you!"

Pulling her scarf closer to her, the girl fights on. For what seems like an eternity she trods through the snow. She stumbles and falls more times than can be counted, the wind lashing at her from every direction. Her journey seems to be one without a destination. Yet she fights on through the endless snow.

At long last, she stops, in what seems to be in the middle of nowhere. After looking around for a short moment, she nods to herself in satisfaction.

"Fuko has a good feeling about this place. As good a feeling as one can have in this rude world, that is." She scowls up at the sky as if challenging it to contradict her.

"Just you wait, nasty, unhelpful world. After Ushio finds her friend, she will make you go away. You will woe the day you picked a fight with Fuko! Ushio will make you go away. Fuko remembers playing here, all this used to be..."

Then she stops, blinking slightly and looking confused. The slowly, with a deep sigh, she hangs her head, her posture deflating like a balloon.

"Fuko knew it would happen. Because it has happened before. Little by little, we'll all forget Ushio. The pieces fade from our minds. Until she's gone."

"But don't you worry! Fuko would never forget Ushio. She would never! Never!"

For a second the little girl's face stands proud and defiant. Then a horrible realization dawns on her. Her eyes go wide with panic and her gaze flickers in all directions as if the was desperately searching for something she has lost. Finally, heavy tears push through and she collapses in a miserable heap in the snow.

"Fuko can't remember what Ushio looks like anymore," the girl sobs.

Listless, the girl crawls up in the snow, hugging her knees. For the longest time, she just lays there. At last, she screams, a howl so intense that it even drown out the howling gale. Her body flails around in the snow with impotent rage. Hammering the snow with her fists she finally gets up on her knees.

"No! No, no, no, no! Fuko will not give up! Fuko will never, ever, give up. Fuko will always fight for Ushio. Also now, Ushio's mom and dad are fighting too! Fuko is no longer alone!"

Even if her hands and face are as white as the snow itself, the little girl starts to furiously dig into the ground, sending lumps of ice and snow flying in all directions.

"Ushio just needs to hang on a little longer. Just a little longer!"

As the girl digs deeper and deeper into the endless white ground the winds tore a ribbon from her hair, sending it flying high. She doesn't even seem to mind, continuing digging into the snow. The ribbon flies higher and higher into the sky, out into a snowy landscape without end. Up from high above, it becomes clear that the snowy landscape is littered with holes. Hundreds of them, all dug by a pair of small hands that simply refuses to give up.


	9. My choice

Nagisa felt like she was going to throw up. The room was spinning before her eyes. She no longer knew what was the truth and what was only a lie. Was she a married mother or a withered husk of a woman? Was the man who had just rushed out of the room her husband or a nameless homeless man she'd never seen before? Nothing made sense and her head felt like it was going to burst.

Maybe it had all been a fever dream. Maybe she wasn't even here. Perhaps she was at home, twitching in her bed, losing her mind. Perhaps she was dying. It certainly made more sense. Nagisa let herself sag down onto the floor, her limbs sapped of the energy that had infused them just a minute ago.

"At times, we all have to choose what is real to us," the floor whispered back at her.

Somewhere far away, in an icy forgotten world, a golden-eyed girl jerked her head up like a bloodhound catching whiff of a familiar scent.

In the real world Nagisa reached up and touched her hair with a trembling hand. It was short, just barely there. No long unruly locks. Tears silently dripped onto the floor. She wanted it all to be real. She didn't want to live in this miserable world. Why had he left her here all alone? Had he only stayed, perhaps she could have allowed herself to believe. But all alone, cold on the floor, it was too hard. Too much. She couldn't do it alone.

"Dad's like that, he runs away. You know that. He needs you to anchor him, to keep him steady," whispered the wind blowing in from the open window. It played through her hair, caressing her cheeks. "He's a little broken. But you always manage to fix him, to guide him. He's lost without you."

In the other world, another girl raced across a frozen plain at breakneck speed, leaping from snowbank to snowbank, grey hair fluttering behind her in the icy breeze.

Nagisa took a deep breath. With great effort, she pushed herself up onto her elbows. The open door was only a few feet away, yet it might as well have been on the other side of the world. And she was so tired. It would be so easy to just lie down and give up. So very easy.

"It would," the door agreed back. "Is that what you want to do, mother?"

Biting down hard and clenching her fist, brown eyes fiercely locked on the threshold, Nagisa inched forward.

* * *

Tomoya panted hard as he dried his mouth on his sleeve. The contents of his stomach lay on the ground in front of him. His head was throbbing and the tears were pushing through faster than he could wipe them away. Back there in the hospital room was the girl he loved. The girl he was meant to be with. So why was he out here?

 _Ha, love! Who do you think you're kidding? You can't love, you only want. You don't deserve love. That's why mom was taken away and dad beat you. You may have that girl fooled for now but she will realize what you really are soon enough. No one will ever love you._

For once, the words in his head rang hollow. That girl in there would never falter, would never give up on him, would never leave him. Tomoya could feel it.

 _Yet just like all the rest, she left you in the end, didn't she? Just like mom. That girl loved you, trusted you, gave you everything. And what did you give her in return? You murdered her and abandoned her child, the very thing she died saving. You never loved her, you only used her and then discarded her and her child, like broken toys. That's the kind of person you are._

That same old image, yet intensified a thousandfold, flashed through his mind: The dead girl on that winter's night. Then another, again in the snow, where he held a tiny limp body in his arms, feeling the warmth slowly fading. The thoughts were like rusty knives ripping in and out of his heart. Tomoya had to get away from it all, had to get the thoughts out of his head. And he only knew one way.

 _That's right. Crawl back into the bottle, down into your hole and run away from everything. Yet again. After all, that's all your good for. Leave life to the people who deserve it._

* * *

Nagisa was walking. Not in a wheelchair, not crawling on the ground on all fours, not stumbling around like some horror out of a movie, but walking, one foot in front of the next, like a normal person. For most people, this might seem trivial but for Nagisa, it was nothing less than a miracle.

At first, she dared not look down, as if looking at her feet might dispel whatever magic kept her going. But after a while, as she made her way across the street into downtown Hikarizaka the fear just faded from her mind. Slowly she realised that this was how things were supposed to be. Moving around felt good, it felt natural. She felt, if not great, then at least capable, alive. So what if she wasn't the strongest or if she got sick once in a while? Why should that stop her from living a normal life? Why should she have to be confined to hospitals and bedrooms? No, that was not her, not anymore. She refused to be that person, no matter what.

A couple of passing schoolgirls looked up at her with wide eyes. Nagisa tried to smile back in her using her most confident and kind face, not wanting to scare the poor children. She was, after all, shuffling barefooted down the street wearing nothing but a hospital gown.

"Wow, what a pretty lady," the girls gaped after her.

Nagisa looked down at her feet. The heels of her shoes made a click, click, click sound against the pavement. Above it flowed a simple blue dress and across her chest a plain white shirt. She reached up to touch her hair which was now loosely pinned up in a messy bun on her head. Turning over her other hand she found it occupied holding a simple purse. She traced the seams with her fingertips, remembering who she had made it herself out of some old curtains to save money so Ushio could get the doll she really wanted for Christmas.

As she breathed in, her bra pushed uncomfortably against her chest. Not wanting to wear nursing bras anymore, Nagisa had gone back to using underwear from her high school days. But she realized now that after Ushio, they had all become painfully inadequate. Nodding to herself, she decided she would have to get new ones, now that her body shape had stabilised again. Nothing fancy, but at least something comfortable. With her husband's promotion, she should be able to squeeze it into this month's budget. Blushing, she wondered if she could perhaps even afford one set that was a little more playful. What would he like?

"LA-LA-LA-LA! Mom! I don't want to listen to such...lewd thoughts! The walls at home are thin enough as it is," the pavement pouted back up her, hands firmly clasped over its ears. "Didn't you have something you needed to do?"

In the far away, the golden eyed girl abruptly stopped and started to dig one more time, clawing at the frozen ground with nothing but her tiny bare hands, sending snow and ice flying in all directions.

Nagisa raised her eyes. She did have something to do.

* * *

Back in his alley, as the drink slowly claimed his mind, Tomoya remembered. He remembered everything. The girl in his dreams, the girl he had just met. They were the same. Her eyes, her hair, her smile. He remembered meeting her, remembered falling in love with her, remembered touching her, remembered her becoming the half of his soul that he had always yearned for. His Nagisa.

And he remembered destroying her. Remember holding her limp hand that winter night when then child he had put into her had been born. A child that he would abandon and only find again when her time had almost run out. And when his only child had drawn her last breath in his arms he had cursed the world, wishing it would all go away, wishing that none of it had ever happened. For once in a life filled with sorrow, the world had granted his wish.

He had gotten a second chance, a chance to go back and save them. A chance to create a world where none of them would ever have to meet him, where he would leave the love of his life alone that day at the bottom the long, winding road up the hill to his old high school. This perfect world where they didn't have to suffer knowing him.

But he was weak and he knew it. Weak and selfish. He had almost squandered this precious second chance, falling into the same trap again. The trap of love, of hope. When he was near her, he just couldn't help himself. He couldn't risk that. There was only one way to make sure history would not repeat itself, that she would be free of him forever.

He knew what he had to do.

With shaking hands, he picked up the last bottle and holding it like a club, smashed it against the brick wall behind him. It promptly shattered, leaving a jagged, sharp edge. With shaking hands, Tomoya raising the broken bottle to his throat, feeling the glass push into his skin. A drop of hot blood ran down his throat.

 _That's right, just a little further and they'll be free of you forever. For her, do it for her, to save her. Your life for hers. For once in your life, do something right._

Taking a deep breath, Tomoya took one last deep breath. For Nagisa.

"NO!"

Someone was standing in the alley entrance. At first, Tomoya didn't recognize the figure. It wasn't the golden-eyed girl that seemed to show up every time he had these kinds of dark thoughts, berating him every time he thought of ending it all. This girl was taller, older, a young woman in full bloom.

Tomoya squinted. It couldn't be. It just couldn't be the girl he had visited in the hospital just hours ago, that girl had barely been able to walk. But it was the girl in his dreams, all the same, come to haunt him one last time.

"No, no, no, no. Stay away from me. You have to stay away from me!" He yammered.

"These memories I have. Of us. Of our daughter. It's real, isn't it? We're real. She's real." Nagisa demanded, taking a step towards him. But shaking his head, her husband crawled away from her, across the broken glass, deeper into the alley.

"No, forget it, forget me. Just go, please just go."

"How can you say that? After all that has happened, how could you leave me? Don't you love me anymore?"

The look of hurt on her face was more than Tomoya could take. "You don't understand," he sobbed, clutching the bloody broken bottle, tears and snot running down his face. "You...you...do...don't..." He swallowed hard, pointing towards her. "I never left you, you left me!"

It suddenly dawned on Nagisa, like pieces of a puzzle falling into place. "In your reality, I don't survive."

Tomoya lowered his head in shame. "Now you know."

"It's the only way I could be forced to leave you, the only way all this twisted world could have come to pass. I'm so sorry, I can only imagine what you must have been through," she responded, biting her lip, tears in her eyes. Carefully, like someone approaching a cornered animal, Nagisa took a small step forwards. "But I'm here now."

Tomoya immediately drew back again, shaking his head. "You asked what happened to our daughter. In the end, she dies as well. In the end, it's all for nothing. Our little girl died in my arms," he sobbed, remember his moment in the snow with his daughter. "I can't let that happen, you have to understand that."

"Why then?" Nagisa screamed at him, the sound of her voice forcing the darkness back into the corners. "Why do I remember her?"

From far away, an icy gale rushed through the alley, as if summoned by Nagisa's scream. Raising his hands to shield his face, Tomoya watched as Nagisa's hair, backlit by the streetlights in the street beyond, tore free from the knot and fluttered free in the wind. Full of determination she straightened her back and drew herself up to her full, if somewhat modest, height.

"You say we both die, but I remember taking Ushio to daycare in her blue uniform, I remember going to your grandmother with her, remember her first day of school. How can I remember all that if I'm dead? If she's dead?"

Wobbling slightly yet unrelenting, Nagisa advanced down the alley.

"I remember that she likes pigs, that she's always been short for her age, how she hates losing at baseball, how she sits by the window waiting all the nights when you have to work late. I remember how she cried and refused to let go of the door the day when we moved out of our tiny studio apartment into the new house. How do you know my memories are false and your's are true? Why should my reality be any less real than yours?"

"New house?" Tomoya stammered. For an instant, reality sort of shuddered. When he looked, Tomoya wasn't holding a bottle, but a very worn screwdriver. He found himself not sitting down, dressed in a filthy coat but standing tall dressed in a hardhat and a crisp supervisor's outfit. Sun was shining down from all sides and the alley walls seemed to shrink away. He frowned for a second but then violently shook his head, eyes full of regret. Instantly they were back in the gloomy alley.

"No, not again! I'm doing this for you! I can't let you take that risk," he screamed, clutching the broken bottle so hard his knuckles turned white, steeling himself for what he felt had to be done.

At first, Nagisa's form seemed to flicker, and for a moment her dress was replaced with a torn and dirty hospital gown. She seemed to deflate, sinking down towards the ground. But then, panting hard, she forced herself up on her feet again, her voice but a whisper but her eyes full of fire. "You. Don't. Get to decide that."

"Wh...what?" Tomoya knew that voice and knew he was in for it now. Nagisa was a very gentle soul, opting out of confrontation whenever possible. But on some occasions, on some issues, she wouldn't budge so much as an inch. Like that night, when he had wanted to flee the city with her, to run away from his past. Away from his relationship with his dad, which had been like an open wound inside him, that he had just wanted to ignore. She hadn't let him. On matters like these, her will was iron. Having lived with her for many years, he knew. She could be really stubborn when she wanted to. Sheepishly he cowered as his cross wife advanced on him.

"What I choose to do with my life is not something you can decide for me. How I live it, who I spend it with and what risks I choose to take. You can advise, you can support, you can love, but in the end, the choice is mine, not yours. You have no right to take that away from me."

He just gaped at her, having never even considered that.

"I told you, I also remember. I remember that I chose to give birth to Ushio, remember how fiercely I wanted her. To have a child with you. I begged you for months, visited the shrine to pray for a baby every day and then literally threw myself at you every night. Don't tell me you've forgotten that."

He hadn't, it was one of those things she had refused to yield on. Taking advantage of that moment, Nagisa closed the final distance between them. Gently she lowered Tomoya's arm. The bottle-turned-screwdriver slipped from his fingers and clattered on the cobblestones below. She threw her arms around him, holding him tight.

"Please, don't...I can't," Tomoya sobbed into her soft hair. She was just so soft and smelled so good. "What if the same thing happens again? What if you're taken from me again? What if you have to die again? How can we be sure?"

"We can't. So walk away and leave me behind if you have to. But don't you dare say you're doing it for me. Because I've made my choice." Nagisa tried to keep her voice steady but could not help but to choke as she clung to him with all her feeble might, daring him to try. Tomoya could feel the heat from her body against his own. She looked up at him with those big amber eyes and all the colours of the world raced around her, fracturing the darkness like a pane of glass cracking under pressure.

"For even if you're right, even if I have to die again, I would do it all again without so much as a single regret. Take it from someone with experience husband: If you have to die, make sure it's for something worth dying for." Raising herself up on her tippy toes, she kissed him and the dark alley shattered into a million pieces all around them.


End file.
